New Beginnings
by merderjunkie
Summary: An alternate ending to the opening scene of 1x01. Short, fluffy little one-shot. T for sexual references, but could easily be K . Enjoy!


**A/N: I know, I know, I should be updating A New Kind of Love, but that story just writes itself during study hall, and then I get nothing outside of school. This fluffy little one-shot, though, is making itself right at home in Microsoft Word right now, so enjoy it, please? And I promise I'll update A New Kind of Love by the end of the week. Read and review!**

* * *

Meredith awoke as the streaming sunlight worked its way past the membrane of her eyelids, warming the blackness inside to a cozy red. She squinted as she blinked her eyes open, attempting to shield her sensitive green orbs from the harsh sunlight. _First day of work,_ her mind bleated weakly, somewhere behind _food, water, aspirin, _and _clothing. _Groaning, she rose to her feet only to find a vaguely familiar, _very_ good-looking figure lying prone on the floor, not a scrap of clothing on his body save the blanket covering his lower back and ass. _Yum. _There went her mind again. Not being able to call the previous night's events to mind just yet, Meredith chose to pick up the blanket and drop a pillow on the guy's ass, hoping to God that his memory could fill in the blanks in hers.

He lifted his deliciously shaggy head off the ground, awoken by the impact of the pillow, and let out a low groan. That, too, sounded vaguely familiar. He looked around blearily before catching sight of her black, lacy bra on the floor next to his head and lifting it up as though it were crime scene evidence, or a dollar bill whose watermark needed to be inspected.

"This is, uh..." he muttered, reluctantly making eye contact with Meredith as he struggled to describe the situation. She could have sworn she saw his cheeks flush slightly, and that was when her memory chose to come back to her. The bar, the charming, handsome stranger, and the great fun that ensued. Still, no matter how charming, handsome, or adorable he was, this had to end.

"...Humiliating on so many levels," she finished his thought for him. "You have to go." She was wrapped in securely in the blanket now, and inching slowly towards the stairs, hoping to make her escape sooner rather than later.

He sat up slightly, leaning back on his elbows. "Why don't you just come back down here, and we'll pick up where we left off?" So he was one of _those._ Ignoring the fluttery feelings deep in the pit of her stomach that screamed, _ditch work and have sex with _him _all day,_ she continued to protest against the stranger's (however welcome) advances.

"No, seriously, you have to go. I'm late, which is not what you want to be on your first day of work, so..." She let the rest of her sentence go to the dogs, not wanting to go spreading her life story to the naked guy on her floor, the identity of which she was still unaware of. He seemed to get the hint and rose, the sight of his toned chest and perfect v-shaped torso doing nothing for her self-control. Nor did the idea of what was currently blocked from her view by nothing but the couch. And that could be easily fixed if she just shifted back a little, changing the angle... _No. Bad Meredith. Sex with strangers is wrong. For all you know, he gave you syphilis._

"So, you actually live here?" he asked as he began to shrug into his clothes. Okay, so he _wasn't_ getting the hint. No personal details. Did this guy not understand the unspoken rules of the one-night-stand?

"No," she denied in response.

"Oh." He seemed surprised.

"Yes," she corrected herself. "Well, kind of."

"Oh," he repeated, now sounding more than a little like a broken record. _Broken records are not attractive, _she insisted to herself. _Thus, this guy is not attractive. _She was so busy rambling to herself, that she hadn't even realized Broken Record was still talking. "...Nice. Huh. So, how do you _kind of_ live here?"

No, no, no, no, no. This guy had obviously never had a one-night-stand in his _life_. "I moved two weeks ago from Boston. It was my mother's house. I'm selling it." Short and sweet. She continued to inch imperceptibly towards the stairs. Work was now seriously looming on her horizons, and it wouldn't look very good if _The Ellis Grey's daughter _was late on the first day, now was it?

"Oh, I'm sorry."

"For what?" she asked as she screwed up her face in confusion.

"You said... _was,_" the man said awkwardly, and it occurred to Meredith how that had sounded.

"Oh, my mother's not dead. She's..." Wait. Why was she even bothering? This guy just needed some schooling in the mechanics of a one-night stand. "You know what? We don't have to do the thing."

"Oh. We can do anything you want." How come everything that left his mouth had to sound dirty? It really wasn't doing anything for her resolve to get out of this without a three-bedroom house and a picket fence. _No relationships,_ she reminded herself. _Relationships get in the way of surgeries. And surgeries are important. Besides, boyfriends leave. But surgeries don't. Stick with surgeries._ She realized that the man was looking at her expectantly, waiting for her to return the conversational tennis ball to him.

"Not the _thing_. Exchange the details, pretend we care." She paused awkwardly. He was still waiting for something resembling coherence. "Look. I'm going to go upstairs and take a shower, okay? And when I get back down here, you won't be here. So, um... goodbye... uh..." His name. Damn. Why didn't she even know his name? Somewhere in her many spiels, he had helpfully covered the delicious expanse of his upper body with the red shirt he'd looked _so _good in the previous night.

"Derek," he supplied, buttoning said red shirt. Derek seemed cocky, as if she should have known, but she was relatively sure that he didn't know her name, either. He certainly wasn't exactly forthcoming with his knowledge, or lack thereof. Yeah, he definitely didn't know her name. The idea was comforting.

"Derek, right. Meredith," she offered back, smiling shyly as he shook her hand. Damn, he was charming. He swung himself jauntily over the back of the couch, still holding her hand firmly in his, and she was transported back to the previous night, with the firm touch of his hands... elsewhere. And the light was hitting him just right, and that smile... damn. All of a sudden, she was rooted to the spot. She couldn't move, and... damn.

"Meredith," Derek repeated. He made the name she'd hated for the majority of her life sound almost... screw almost. _Definitely_ beautiful.

"Yeah," she confirmed, his smile rendering her unable to come up with anything better. "Mhm."

"Nice meeting you." He sounded genuine. Maybe it wouldn't be so bad, if they just went out on a couple dates. No one said Derek-From-The-Bar was like the other string of men in her life that just picked up and moved on. Maybe Derek-From-The-Bar was different. In fact, he didn't seem to be letting go of her hand.

"Bye, Derek," she decided finally, withdrawing her hand from his grasp. She was halfway to the stairs when his voice stopped her.

"Wait, Meredith," he called after her. "You said it was your first day of work?"

"Yeah." _Do not date this man. Men are trouble. Surgeries aren't trouble. Don't supply any more information._

"Good luck. It's the first day for the interns at my hospital, so I get where you're coming from."

Wait. What? "Oh. Ah, which hospital do you work at?"

"Seattle Grace. Why?"

She ignored the second half of his statement. "Oh. Ah, which department?" Now _she_ sounded kind of like a broken record.

"I'm a neurosurgeon. Department head, actually." She could have sworn she saw him puff up a little bit. Confident, but not outright arrogant. It was strangely sexy.

"Oh. Wow. Yeah, looks like I'm your intern," she said awkwardly. "Surprise..." She expected him to hightail it out the door and leave the city. Just like all men. Instead, the sun seemed to shine brighter through the windows as his smile widened.

"Small world, huh?" She nodded weakly. "How about we grab some coffee after your first shift?"

_Don't date this man, _her mind repeated. _Do not. Bad news. Police line, do not cross. _But her heart had other ideas. "I'd like that. I'd like that a lot."

"Well, I can give you a ride to the hospital, Doctor..."

"Doctor Grey," she supplied shyly.

"Excellent. I'll go make some coffee while you shower. Kitchen's that way?" He gestured vaguely behind him. How he already knew his way around her house was beyond her.

"Uhm, yeah." She didn't have much in the way of words, still in shock by the charm of this man, so undeterred by their situation. "Thank you, Doctor..." she added as an afterthought, hoping to level the playing field and find out both of his names.

"Shepherd. Derek Shepherd."

"Thanks, Doctor Shepherd."

She turned and wandered up the stairs, thinking to herself that this guy might just be different.

Little did she know just how different this particular guy was.


End file.
